I am looking for a practical way to find metal posts location in a finished basement walls or finished ground floor walls. I am trying to understand how my house was built. I would like to remove a ...

Background
We recently purchased a home built in mid-50s. At the time, no structural movement or displacement was noted by the home inspector. Over the last few weeks, there have been long cracks on ...

I am knocking down a structural wall in my house and replacing it with a steel I-beam. Where would I get that kind of thing? I am not even sure what to google. The beam is going to be about 20' long ...

First some background:
Our home is a 2 story detached. On the main floor it is entirely open concept, with a ~14' drywalled horizontal support beam separating the kitchen from the living room area. ...

I am renting a house built in the 1940s. The mortar around the brick was cracked causing leaks. Someone had built a chimney around the outside of the original chimney. So outside it's twice the size ...

Given a trench dug below foundation level, what's the proper way to backfill? Here I'm talking about a trench below the bottom edge of an unreinforced concrete foundation built in 1950, supporting a ...

I want to knock down an interior wall in my house and make a dropped ceiling flush with the remainder of the room. It should be a fairly straightforward home improvement project that I am quite sure I ...

I'm looking at a home that has a vertical gap or crack running the height of the exposed concrete block foundation. The crack is near the center of the home, about a foot to the right of the concrete ...

I am trying to determine if my house is up to code with respect to some holes that I found bored in the ceiling joists. The holes are about 1 inch in diameter and at least 2 inches from the top and ...

I have a covered patio that extends 10' from the house towards the yard/pool and has a width of 30-33'. The covered patio seems to be part of the roof, I even have access from the attic as we ran some ...

I am doing some remodeling and want to run a 6-inch HVAC (kitchen exhaust hood) duct through the floor joists. There is one section where the path is impeded by a standard floor joist cross-brace. Can ...

I live on the 3rd (top) floor of a condo building. Our back door - which opens to the outside, is not square. The building was built in 2006 and the drywall around the door at the corners is cracked ...

I recently asked my structural engineer to provide some calculations and drawings to remove the arch and further open up the opening between the double fronted sitting room of my 2.5 storey (2 at the ...

I have a support post in my attic that is holding up one side of a minor ridge beam. The post is sitting on two 2x6s on their backs, and which span 20 inches. Yes, these 2x6s are not on edge -- they ...

I have an old house (built in the 1940s) that is structural brick. I want to add a small window on the wall to the upstairs to let in a bit more light. Is it possible to add a window to a structural ...

I'm in the process of installing central vac lines (2" OD) in a finished house, and I am trying to run a line into the upstairs hallway. I have removed drywall in the garage below and drilled a hole ...

There's a lot of information -- and even some debates -- on which has a stronger yield strength between square and round steel tube. The majority points to square when the dimensions are equal at the ...

I am having the ceiling in the finished part of my basement redone, and have it fully open now. I can see the connection of the joists to the headers have given somewhat, as the house is 85 years old ...

Long story short: I am working on a 1960's house with no rafter ties. The rafters themselves are now attached with screws and strong-ties (previously just double nailed!) but I don't have faith in the ...

I'm going to build a single story addition to my home with a width of 14ft. I plan on using ceiling joists every 16" but I'm not sure which size to get. The roof will be asphalt shingles and the attic ...

We own a Gambrel house built in 1978. I want to remove a six foot wall section that includes a doorway. This wall runs parallel to the floor joists in the basement. The main center beam is about three ...

I live in a developing country (so don't have much faith in building codes), and have been experiencing increasingly noticeable and frequent "shaking" in my top fifth floor apartment. I'm seriously ...